


Dance on Our Graves

by whatcheer



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Codependency, Death, Depression, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Family History, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Multi, POV Second Person, Pre-Canon, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-14
Updated: 2014-12-14
Packaged: 2018-03-01 12:12:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2772572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatcheer/pseuds/whatcheer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On the morning of a winter day in 1976, you first meet John Watson. It will not be the last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dance on Our Graves

**Author's Note:**

> First fic in the Sherlock fandom and first take on the characters: eternal lurker escapes the lurkish confines of her mind.
> 
> The final pairing is Sherlock and John. Since this narrates John's past before the canon, there will be other OFCs (briefly mentioned) and, naturally, Mary.
> 
> This is a character study, first and foremost. Pay attention to the warnings and remember this is a WIP!

_I hear something out there calling my name_   
_No matter where I turn it all looks the same_   
_I never sleep and I just stay in the rain_   
_But the burning in my blood never came_

Paper Route, 'Dance on Our Graves'

 

(5)

It is morning, on a winter day in 1976.

You stand, unmoving, in front of one of the large white waiting rooms. Around you, the wind moves in relentless whiplashes against surfaces, causing the snow to swirl in miniature whirlwinds through the busy, bustling streets. People are wrapped in thick coats, their faces disappearing behind scarves, underneath hats. They are one single colourless impression: one single frantic, hasty movement of dark shades and whites beneath a sky of smeared ashes.

These people do not concern you.

You are waiting in front of the waiting room that contains another waiting room, which is where you are headed. Soon. It is not long, now. You are waiting, and few people would probably describe it as patient, as calm, if they were inclined to emotive vocabulary; few others would say inexpressibly; most would say inexpressively. These intricacies of language momentarily engage your mind, and you watch as the wind proceeds… storming.

Or biting, you think then, half interested: biting. The wind bites. In sharp, fast snatches, it buries its metaphoric fangs in the people’s skin, letting coldness trickle from its metaphoric mouth like saliva to soak it in goose bumps and shivers. Bites of coldness: coldness. Frost; ice; snow. Different manifestations of coldness. Coldness, a thing, a sensation, one you have never experienced. One time, when you asked a guest of yours about how coldness felt, yielding to your curiosity as sometimes happens, the man had stared at you, at a loss. He had eventually said ‘cold,’ as if it were an obvious thing, as if coldness could be anything _but_ cold. You think about it now. It is winter, it is cold, and the cold is white, like the earth’s new wrapping; old, like the crumbling branches and withered flowers that have expired; biting, like the storm’s teeth; lonely, like people’s hands and fingers hidden in gloves.

It is winter, it is cold, and you think it: the cold is white, and old, and biting, and lonely.

Many think winter a good time to go. Something about feeling less regret for leaving behind a world that is already decaying, or so you have heard.

Jean Watson seems to agree.

The air changes with the familiar tug in the place just a bit beneath your thoughts: a pull, slow but decisive. The wait is over. You watch a snowflake fall; watch it die the moment it touches the tarmac; and you agree. Winter is a good time to go. There is no other season in which things die as often as they do than in winter.

You turn, enter the waiting room—through the walls, naturally—and move towards the other waiting room where she is expecting you. It is a most ordinary day, and Jean Watson looks like any ordinary old woman. Watery blue eyes focus on you the moment you enter. “Hello,” she says, and her round, unassuming face opens in a smile. The lines in it speak of kindness, as much as her entire being speaks of contentment. You let three seconds pass, to make sure no sudden case of hysteria or sobbing will follow, but when she does nothing but watch you, you incline your head in greeting. It’s a cautious movement. You’re not normally welcomed like this, so this is an exception. It does happen, sometimes, when the broken or sad are desperate to go with you; when they do, it’s unpleasant. They misname you relief and do not care for what you really are. Some of your guests are selfish like that.

Jean Watson, though, only tries to brush a small hand over the head of one of the women that sit by her bedside, sobbing, as if to pet her hair. The movement goes through the woman's head, and Jean watches wordlessly for a moment, then says, “Are we going?” and willingly allows her plump, tired body to follow you after you incline your head a second time, slightly belated.

Out in the hallway, the other people move past without sensing either of you. This time, your guest looks vaguely amused as a nurse walks through her, and you watch, somewhat fascinated, as she says, “A good occasion to vent your anger without getting punched for it, I’d bet,” and makes a motion as if to slap another nurse’s face. The gesture, naturally, does not touch the nurse or register within the material world at all, and you startle as Jean laughs a rusty, hearty laugh at that. “Oh, I think I like that,” she says, nodding, as if in answer to some internal debate. She looks at you.

You do not speak, momentarily too taken aback.

“You don’t say much, do you,” Jean says. When silence is her answer, she sighs, and falls silent herself. At length she looks at you again, and says firmly, “There’s a last thing I’d like to do,” eyes turning pleading.

This sudden, last request adjusts the scale: you’re back on familiar ground. They almost always want something, a last wish granted. This, you know how to deal with. You allow your thoughts to shape into words of her language to say, “You cannot stay a day longer,” pre-emptively, because you know how these kind of things go. You can grant small wishes, yes, but an entire day more would upset the balance.

“Wow, you can speak,” Jean says, in a teasing manner. She shakes her head but smiles. “No, that’s okay. I would just like to walk out of the building the normal way.”

You tilt your thoughts to the side and look at her intently, astonished again. It is a strange wish; then again, you have never understood your guests, and Jean Watson appears to be rather an exception. Since it is a strange but simple wish, you agree. “Yes.”

She gives a grateful smile and a nod of her head in acknowledgement, then turns to walk down the corridor. You walk behind her as you ascend the three flights of stairs together calmly. You cannot help but keep eyeing the back of her head, trying to see her thoughts through her wispy, white hair. She surprises you, you have to admit. Not many guests want to talk to you, never mind come with you. Most of them cower at your sight; most of them scream, cry, deny seeing you; some of them have to be dragged away. (It is awful, when you have to drag them away.) There are not many of your guests that make yours a pleasant existence. Jean, though, walks with a high tilt to her chin and a serene gait, and you think, strangely enough, that it is refreshing.

Finally, you exit the stairs and walk down another hallway. Just before the entrance doors, at a large, open area where many of her kind are gathered, she stops. Takes some steps forward, stops again. Turns to the left, looks down.

You follow, intrigued despite yourself. You come to a halt beside her and look at what she’s looking.

You sigh. Sentiment. Of course. In this, she is no different than the rest.

On the chairs, two children are sitting; a boy of five, and a girl of seven. They are both flour-blond and pale, and in their dark clothes, the only thing of colour to them is the red of their mouths and the blue of their eyes. Though the girl is taller, she has her narrow face buried in her brother’s shoulder, seeking comfort for her tears. The boy’s small, compact frame is almost lost among long limbs wrapped around him. He sits there calmly, staring down at his feet as his hand moves in absent circles across his sister’s back, the other held loosely in his lap.

In the roundness of his face and the flat tip of his nose, you can see your guest’s face. This is the first time you meet John Watson, and even despite the situation, his face is absent from any expression: a blank slate. _Tabula rasa._

This is also the first time the Watsons surprise you.

Instead of shedding a single tear for his grandmother, like his sister, John remains still as the seconds tick by, like nothing is amiss. You watch the utter vacuousness of his face, thinking that this is not how it is supposed to go. You are always glad to be spared overt displays of sentiment, yes, but usually sentiment is expressed in some way, somehow; not so this boy. Somehow, not so John Watson. Jean, too, is a contradiction with how she smiles down at her grandson, unconcerned at his lack of emotion. Instead of being affronted, she keeps smiling, content and calm.

“This is John,” she says, softly, like imparting a secret. “He’s my odd duck.”

You watch her as she watches him, and you remember some of the impressions that make up your definition of warmth: intimate, fire, slow, and tender. Jean’s eyes are all this. They hold all the sentiment that the boy lacks.

Something ripples down, in a narrow shiver, behind your thoughts. You avert your gaze, slave to the shiver that is like winter. You endure it until it is gone. Just then, Jean says, “Take care of Harry, John,” and walks without another word towards the entrance doors, and right through them until she is out of your sight.

You look down at the boy a last time and ask yourself, wondering, how something as very unspecial as this boy with his plain face and generic eyes and small hands and feet can be so special to someone else. You think, curiously, about what it must be like to be special to someone or something, or to have someone or something special to you, in whatever way.

You realise all this is tied very closely to sentiment, something your existence is incapable of.

You step out, at last, into the openness of the world beyond the large cubic waiting room. Jean is standing there, in the same spot you were standing before while waiting for her. Her hands are clasped behind her back, and she has her chin tilted upwards, mouth slightly open. Against the snow falling down, her eyelashes flutter in imitation of when she could still feel it, as though she could still feel it.

You watch her and think about how so many humans prefer an imitation only to spare the pain of acknowledging they will never have the real thing. Then you remember water, and stillness, and inside. It makes you pause, so you shake your thoughts away. Jean is looking at you when you are done. “I never introduced myself,” she says. “Jean Watson.”

“I know,” you say, because you do. You are silent until she raises her eyebrows, a silent request that feels like a command. Your existence is a command in itself, so you do not take commands. Yet, she smiled at you when she saw you, and she introduced herself (this happened all of six times, up to now), and above all: she knows what you are. And she did all this, still.

So you say, “Death.”

Her human language makes your naturalness sound cruel: unfounded, but true. She just tilts her head to the side, regarding you curiously. “I know,” is all she says, and if you could smile, you suppose you would do it now: it is nice, for once, to be known. ‘Relief’ has never really suited you.

At length, she says, "Shall we, then?" and reaches out her hand as if she could touch you, as if she could touch anything in her immaterial body, just because. You say, "Yes," and for no reason you mimic her gesture, let the right side below your thoughts sweep out in one long, slow movement. If you had arms, if you had hands, you could touch her.

As she goes, Jean Watson's eyelashes flutter again in the snow, still without sensation. She is unerringly human until the end, this ghost, your guest; and in the snow, she holds out her hand and smiles, as if yours were a tangible touch, until you take her away.

*

Inside, John Watson has still not moved, neither his limbs nor his face. Beside his body executing all the basic functions of the living, his only reaction remains the steady brush of his hand over his sister's back: comfort given, no grief indulged.

You do not think of him again.


End file.
